Day 27 Round Top, TX to Navasota, TX

June 5

Round Top, TX to Navasota, TX

60.5 Miles
2950 ft of climbing

Map:


http://www.mapitpronto.com/index.cfm?fuseAction=routePlanner.viewDBRide&rideID=1834

We felt such gratitude today we wanted to thank everyone who sends us notes or comments on the blogsite. Each and every one means allot to us. Chris and I agree my cousin Tom is our missing rider. We both want to go for a ride with you Tom. We might get to do it with my friend Michael. I think he might join us in Alabama and ride with us for a couple of days. We agreed we'll be wheel suckers and then figured it will probably be a dead calm. A wheel sucker is someone who always rides in the draft and never does any work.

It was a great beginning to the day. I set my alarm and did a little writing. We had breakfast at 8:00 and coffee a little before. We figured we'd get an early start.

We went in the ranch house at the Outpost and sat at the kitchen bar. It was just the four of us. Lenore is a very gracious host. When I attempted to compensate her for the accomodations she refused all but a pitance for the cleaning lady. It turns out she's coming to Santa Fe for the opera later in the summer. I hope she gets in touch.

We talked about serendipity and how our ride seems to often be the beneficiary. The world is full of kind and decent people. It's a pleasure to meet so many of them on this adventure. It amazes both Chris and I and we marvel thankfully.

We headed out in a very stiff wind blowing 25-30 MPH. It blowed all day long. Wah, wah. It wasn't in our faces but it was a cross wind in the best case and came at our two o'clock most of the time. It kept things hard and slow.

We came to Independence, TX and stopped for lunch. The man at the general store, lunch counter asked if we were cross country riders. When we told him we were he handed us a log he keeps and asked us to sign it. It was fun reading other riders' entries. There is a Dutch family about two weeks ahead of us. They are travelling with two young children. We figure if they're heading to St. Augustine (they didn't mention their direction) we would probably catch them.

We got to a town called Washington and filled up with water and gatorade. Our hostess Tina wanted to hear about our ride. We pulled out the maps and took a look at what lay ahead. When we hit 1800 miles today we moved on to Map Segment five of seven. We originally intended to go to Coldspring but it would be much too late for dinner or laundry when we got there. Now the problem becomes riding in the heat after the places in these small towns have closed. There are more towns than West Texas but they roll the streets up early and we consume water at a ridiculous rate requiring refilling evey twenty five miles or so. We decided to stop while we could eat and launder and watch the first game of the NBA finals.

Mission accomplished.

More to come.